PYONGYANG, North Korea -- Watch out, Hollywood. North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, a longtime film buff, has ordered his nation's tiny film industry to begin competing in the big leagues.

Mr. Kim, known to his countrymen as "the Dear Leader," recently paid a visit to North Korea's Pyongyang Film Studio to give auteurs the benefit of his "on-the-spot guidance."

His message was combative.

"He said we are not competing with U.S. and European films. We have to beat U.S. films," Kim Man-sok, the head of the studio's foreign sales division, told foreign reporters.

In North Korea, what the Dear Leader wants, the Dear Leader gets. So the first potential international blockbuster already is in the pipeline...